Without Vicky...(Part I)

Almost the end of August, Vicky's dad passed away suddenly in his sleep. I was at a loss as she wanted to go back and I didn't know what arrangements should I think about when she's gone- do I bring my children over to my parent's place or in-laws? How about Caleb's school bus? Do I get a temporary helper? But even if I have a temporary helper, I wouldn't know how much I can trust the new one. I probably still need to place the helper and the children at someone's house. I was very helpless.

There have been nights and days when I could just cry out to God to help me because there's just too much options and too little time to decide. Which is the best? Finally, CT suggested that I can also take no pay leave which I didn't think of. It was a brilliant idea as that would minimise any disruptions. Life would still go on for the children. Well, so I went ahead to apply for my no pay leave...and of course, it still wasn't so smooth. Encountered some obstacles but thank God, managed to finally take leave (3 weeks as she needs to renew her passport back in Phillipines) and to prepare myself mentally and physically for what is to come as I spend time alone with the kids during the day.

We, as a family, sent Vicky off at the airport. Getting tickets for her was also another obstacle which we faced as her passport's validity was less than 6 months. The airlines refused to issue her a ticket. So we kept calling and speaking to different sales guy and finally, we booked the flight for her. Sigh.


Surprisingly the kids didn't even kick up any fuss when she left. We simply explained to them and they just accepted it without any questions or expression of longing for Vicky. Thank God.

For the first week, I had a wonderful time carrying out my role as mother and wife- spending quality time with them by cooking for them, fetching Caleb to the school bus, putting the children to sleep, doing laundry, ironing, vacuuming the floor, mopping the floor, cleaning the toilets, making the beds etc.

Here's some pictures of Danielle having lunch which I personally prepared for her!
Stir fried veggies dish and pork ribs...


And noodles with chicken, pumpkin soup.


And fruits after her lunch


My mornings were more or less fixed. The children would wake up at about 730am. Brush their teeth. Serve breakfast (e.g cakes, bread, cereal). Bathe them together. Change them. Switch on the TV while I go do my own stuff on the computer (e.g emails, read online news, facebooking, blogging, games etc) till about 945am when I go prepare Caleb for his school by changing him to his uniform, preparing his water bottle and school bag.

At 10am, I go down with Danielle to send Caleb off to the school bus as it comes at about 1010am. Then I would sometimes bring Danielle to the playground or bring her straight back home and put her to sleep for her morning nap. She would sleep till about 12 plus pm. So I have about one and a half to two hours of personal time.

During this time, I may choose to do housework like laundry, iron the clothes and at the same time, watch TV in my computer. I love to multi-task as I get lots of things done in a short period of time.


Though it is a major shift from my regular work in school, I enjoyed myself as it felt really rewarding as I would accomplish quite a lot of things during the day. I was quite proud of myself.

Almost everyday, I would have piles and piles of unending amount of clothes for me to wash and iron. Its crazy. I really pity Vicky now that I know how much she has to 'suffer' doing all this!


Then Danielle would wake up from her morning nap and have her lunch. After lunch, she would watch Hi-5 till about 2 plus. Then she would play till its time to go pick Caleb up from school at 330pm.



Sometimes, Danielle may be tired again after lunch and at about 230pm, she may go back to sleep. So while she was sleeping at home, I would quickly scooter off to pick Caleb up from his school bus down at my block as I pray Danielle doesn't wake up. Thank God, of all the times I left her alone in the house sleeping, she did not wake up. In fact, she would be sleeping so soundly for about 2 to 3 hours. As for Caleb, when he comes home from school, he doesn't really sleep since he would sleep during the bus ride. Only rarely, he may request to nap.

So they would sleep till about 4pm. Then I would play with them after that. At times, I would do art and craft with them and since National Day was around the corner, I printed out a Singapore flag for them to colour and use chopsticks to stick on it so that they can wave the flag around.



Then they would watch TV while I go prepare dinner till CT comes home.

Sometimes when Caleb is off to school, I would bring Danielle out if she is not too tired. I even took train with her to Kovan and just walked around. It was fun spending alone time with her.


I am not sure how long I can last without Vicky...

National Day Preview 2010

This year, my school's choir was involved in the National Day Parade. So I had colleagues who had to go down every week for the full day rehearsal. So they have been watching the parade and the fireworks numerous times. They could tell me what time the fighter jets would appear and what time the fireworks would start.

So I took this opportunity to go down for the National Day Preview and decided to let the kids see mainly the fighter jets and fireworks. My colleague told me to be there by 615pm for the fighter jets and so we did. We parked at Marina Square and walked to Esplanade Bay area and waited for the planes to come by.

We first spotted the parachuters...


In between time, we took pictures of the surroundings while the kids were running about and just soaking in the surrounding atmosphere.





There were boats, helicopters occasionally passing us by.




When the fighter jets flew on top of us, Caleb and Danielle were pretty scared. Both of them started crying because it was way too loud for them.



After that, we went for dinner as the fireworks would start later when the sky gets dark. Had dinner at Thai express. While sitting in the restaurant, we could still hear fighter jets flying in the sky. Danielle quickly covered her ears and shouted, "Loud Loud!"



Well, at least it was bearable for her this time since we were indoors.

We ordered fried olive rice and noodles as well as a bowl of tom yam soup. The kids took the rice. They loved it.



Danielle enjoyed feeding herself. She didnt like anyone to feed her. If we tried feeding her, she would scream and start crying. Oh well, its good that she is more independent. We just had to bear with the mess. Its all part of their learning. I am fine with this kind of mess.



After dinner, we sat on the steps outside Esplanade to enjoy the live music while waiting for the fireworks. It wasn't as crowded as I thought it would be. Bearable and very enjoyable. Both my children enjoyed the music and the breeze.





The fireworks came out from the bay area just in front of esplanade. So we were just in front of the fireworks and oh boy, I have never been so close to it in my life!



It was really an experience of a lifetime being so close to the fireworks. An experience I don't think I will ever do it again. Reason is because we were so close to the fireworks that all those black ashes from the fireworks started drizzling down on us! It was a real 4D experience!! It was fun but yet at times, we felt as if the fireworks may just burn us. Haha. But of course, nothing happened after that and we didnt suffer much from the effect. It was just scary at that moment since we have never experienced it before.

Anyway, we had a really enjoyable night and the children kept talking about it all the way home in the car.

Buffet @ Oscar's

Had buffet at Oscar's Cafe & Terrace in Conrad Centennial Hotel tonight. Food reviews of that place were quite good as I researched on the internet, so I was pretty excited. Went there because CT's American colleague and his wife invited us and one more couple from CT's company for dinner.



The buffet had so many variety of good, fresh, quality food! I was amazed at the wide selection!

I attacked the raw food first of course, as I would in any buffet! I am a sucker for sashimi and oyster! I could eat plates and plates of those and that would probably cover the cost of the buffet already!



They had lots of variety of sashimi like the sword fish which is my favourite. But they also had king fish which I have never tried before and raw fresh Jap Clams. Ooo..all so good and fresh!


And there would be a guy behind the counter shucking a whole bar full of fresh, unopened oysters in the ice for you.



After satisfying my oysters and sashimi craving, I attached the crayfish, crawfish, crabs, huge prawns, and mussels. Very sweet and fresh! I was even surprised at the taste of the crawfish as I had those when I was in New Orleans and the ones in Singapore seemed to taste much sweeter, meatier and fresher than in Louisiana which is very strange as crawfish comes mainly from New Orleans.


I was quite full after eating all those raw and cold dishes. Didnt take much cooked food except for claypot grouper which was nice and some fried stuff.

There was also a noodle shed outside the restaurant serving laksa, prawn mee soup,tiger prawn noodles dry, bak ku teh, bak chor mee, tom yam soup noodles, wantan mee etc.

I had the wantan mee, tiger prawns mee (which had giant size prawns) and laksa. All tasted quite authentic and good.

There was just so many varieties of everything...See what I mean..





So for desserts, I had gelato raspberry and passion fruit ice cream while CT had the banana crepe with chocolate gelato.




For about $70 per person, I would highly recommend this to anyone who is thinking of going out on a date or to celebrate a special occasion. Don't forget to order their Californian house red wine to go with the wonderful food. Enjoy!

Happy Birthday Godpa!

Mr Thoh's birthday is exactly one week after Caleb, which is on the 24th July. He turns 70 years old this year (if I am not wrong). He is so fit as he climbs Bukit Timah Hill at least once a week. He would venture into the forest and climb those few hundred gigantic steps which I would probably pant at the 30th step. Went once with him and he moves like a bullet train on the slopes and steady on the steps without any rest at all! Kudos to Mr Thoh!

I brought him and a few of my colleagues to Chin Lee Teochew Restaurant to celebrate his birthday as he likes Teochew food and since its nearby.



The food was nice as usual. Ordered fried mee suah

as well as a special tea jelly dessert which was good because it was not filling and moreover, we felt like it had some kind of cleansing and soothing effect.



Even the presentation for the dessert was nice!



Happy Birthday Thoh Papa. May you have a fruitful and happy life. Stay healthy and strong!

Shing Lee's Anniversary

Shing Lee is one of the leading educational publishers in Singapore and to celebrate their anniversary, they invited schools to join in their celebrations by inviting us to the Singapore flyer for some food and to sit in the flyer for free. I was asked to go and together with 2 more of my colleagues, we made our way there.



I went there without much expectations or excitement as I have been on the flyer before and found it rather boring because it was moving very very very sloooowly. I didnt mind going again since they needed Math teachers to go and it was the company that really matters. Moreover, I hardly have the chance to go out with Serene and Suhaila. It was an opportunity which I didnt mind grabbing.

All of us were rather skeptical as to whether they will start pressurising us to buy books from them during this whole time..as probably we were 'trained' from our experiences in life that there is no such thing as a free lunch. There must be some sort of hidden agenda for bringing us down, treating us to buffet and giving us a free ride to the flyer which costs almost $30 per person (usual price). It must be too good to be true.





The door gift was rather cute. It was milk bottles. The idea is to thank us for 'adopting' them (the publisher) into their schools.


Anyway, in the end, there really wasnt any hidden agenda. They sincerely wanted us to join in their anniversary celebration. So right after our hi-tea buffet, we went for the ride in the flyer.





The last time I came, the casino resort was not constructed yet. So at least this time round, I saw more things. However, I was still bored and almost fell asleep during the ride.

After the ride, I met up with CT near the helix bridge before we headed to Marina Square for dinner. There was the Youth Olympic Games (YOG) sculpture there at Marina Bay.



We settled in a Myanmar restaurant, Inle in Marina Square for dinner. Because I had quite a lot during the buffet, I wanted to eat something light. So I had soup noodles which I regretted not because its not nice, but CT's fried noodles tasted so much better! Mine just tasted like I could cook that anytime at home.




We had fried gourd for appetisers. Quite interesting. Loved the special chilli sauce



And lastly we had Myanmar version of Ice Kachang



All in all, we were quite satisfied with the food. Only the service was a little tad slow. Costs us about $15 per person.